Hi Tim, and all—

I mentioned earlier: In MSP metro, we’ve started presenting a preliminary delineation that meets Census’s basic requirements, and that we want stakeholders to respond to. We had two presentations last week.

We’re showing the preliminary delineation to local government people – especially in county govts and municipalities populous enough to have multiple tracts – and asking them to consider: What are your needs for small area data? What sub-city service areas or zones or “neighborhoods” do you want to see on the map?

Our preliminary delineation was guided by the following principles…

• Met Council prioritizes aligning Tracts with minor civil divisions (MCD)
• This has substantial downstream benefits for PUMA delineations 2 years from now. (Colleagues in Massachusetts probably know what happens to Place-Of-Work PUMAs when the MCDs, Tracts and PUMAs are not aligned.)
• Concurrently, Census Bureau and Met Council prioritize preserving historical Tract boundaries, nesting new Tracts in the old
• But we may re-tract boundaries in the infrequent situations of changed city boundaries or new/relocated major roadways.
• Data users demand more detailed and localized geographic units. We will split apart Tracts and Block Groups that have population exceeding what’s considered ideal.
• NEW in 2019-20: Met Council considers a secondary priority the alignment of Block Groups with Met Council TAZs (used for transportation analysis and modeling) -- where the priorities above and Census’s rules allow

Hope that helps!

Todd Graham Principal Forecaster  |  Metropolitan Council   |  Research todd.graham@metc.state.mn.us P. 651.602.1322  |  F. 651.602.1674 390 North Robert Street  |  St. Paul, MN 55101  |  metrocouncil.org/data

From: Reardon, Tim <TReardon@mapc.org>
Sent: Monday, March 04, 2019 11:14 AM
To: sdc_mlist@lists.berkeley.edu; ctpp-news@chrispy.net
Cc: joshua.wixom@census.gov; GEO PSAP (CENSUS/GEO) <geo.psap@census.gov>; Graham, Todd <todd.graham@metc.state.mn.us>
Subject: PSAP -- Other criteria or principles for delineation?

Hi all,

I imagine many of us are busy diving into GUPS and getting started with the delineation work.  Obviously there are specific Census-defined thresholds for each type of statistical areas, but I’m curious to know if there are other criteria or principles that folks are using as they consider possible adjustments.

Historical continuity aside, what makes for a good block group or tract? Should we seek to minimize heterogeneity by drawing boundaries that separate very different neighborhoods/sub-neighborhoods?  Or is it better to have block groups/tracts that include a more diverse set of households and residents?  I would imagine that the approach taken to these questions will affect not only the confidence intervals of the resulting ACS tables, but also the results of whatever research uses those tables.  

Any opinions or literature references on this topic would be most welcome! 

Tim Reardon

Data Services Director
Metropolitan Area Planning Council, Boston

From: Graham, Todd [mailto:todd.graham@metc.state.mn.us]
Sent: Friday, February 22, 2019 1:10 PM
To: sdc_mlist@lists.berkeley.edu; ctpp-news@chrispy.net
Cc: joshua.wixom@census.gov; GEO PSAP (CENSUS/GEO) <geo.psap@census.gov>
Subject: [State Data Centers] PSAP participants in every county: https://www2.census.gov/geo/pdfs/partnerships/psap/Primary_PSAP_Participant_Contact_Information.pdf

Hi friends of Census Tracts—

If it’s useful to you… Census Bureau has published a contacts list of 2020 Census PSAP participating agencies, here: https://www2.census.gov/geo/pdfs/partnerships/psap/Primary_PSAP_Participant_Contact_Information.pdf

This list covers every county in the nation. 

If the listing for your county points to an erroneous agency or a nonworking phone number/email, I suggest you alert Census’s Geog Division: geo.psap@census.gov

By the way, our office, Metropolitan Council of the Twin Cities, has a few upcoming meetings where we’ll be describing our review, validation and redrawing of Census Tracts and Block Groups. We are well into the preliminary work. Starting in March we will be pointing interested stakeholders to preliminary, proposed re-tracting for our 7-county region.

And we will be inviting stakeholders to comment or express their needs for Census stats tabulations for sub-city zones, service areas, etc. We will consider whether those needs can possibly be met with 2020-vintage Tracts and Block Groups.

It’s possible we may receive some comments from outside of our region. When that happens, we will be redirecting commenters to the other county governments and regional development commissions in our state…  May want to bookmark the participants list mentioned above!

Hope that helps.

Cheers,

Todd Graham

Todd Graham Principal Demographer  |  Metropolitan Council   |  Research todd.graham@metc.state.mn.us P. 651.602.1322  |  F. 651.602.1674 390 North Robert Street  |  St. Paul, MN 55101  |  metrocouncil.org/data